Realizing the Impossible
by Sarah1281
Summary: Alloran wasn't sure how he ended up on the ground or why Esplin hasn't gotten back up yet. As the seconds tick by, he begins to have a wonderfully impossible suspicion and no one in his head is mocking him for it. Set during 54.


Realizing the Impossible

Alloran's eyes opened without him having to think about it which was only natural because when was the last time his movements had much to do with him? Not when Esplin was in command, not when he was so heavily sedated he was barely conscious every feeding cycle, and not even when his tail had failed him that day in the meadow.

He just lay there for a moment, breathing, wondering why he hadn't gotten up off of the floor. There was a reason he was on the floor, he was sure, but he did not know what it was. He had been standing there and Esplin had been so angry but also, for once, unwilling to act on it and now he was lying on the floor.

Something must have happened. His head hurt so he must have been knocked out. It wouldn't be the first time.

Something was strange. He was still lying there. It was too undignified for Esplin to lay sprawled out like that for any longer than it took the swelling in his brain to go down and his body to start responding again. And he hadn't said anything either but that wasn't strange. Sometimes he went whole days without saying anything to Alloran. Despite the fact that Esplin had been the only one to ever even speak to Alloran save that fool child of an _Aristh_ those years ago when he should have been killed but hadn't, the silence was a welcome thing. Esplin never said anything he wanted to hear.

Could Esplin just be so disgusted with the situation that he was refusing to engage it at all? It would be rather unexpected but then Esplin could be capable of great pettiness at times. He had tried to have his own twin horribly killed for daring to be mildly successful. Alloran had never been able to see what difference it made if the humans venerated Esplin the lesser's human host but the Visser had seen it as a personal affront and responded accordingly.

Still nothing, still lying there. It wasn't anything to do with him but it did strike him as rather strange.

Esplin truly hated that human Jake. There had been a Yeerk living with him since before Elfangor had even died (for while they did not know for sure when these human children had gotten the power to morph, it had reminded them of those missing human children from that night and Esplin had been a little buoyed by the knowledge that even if he had not been foiled by Andalites all this time at least they had been _Elfangor's _humans) and he had been driven into hiding after his parents had been snatched from him as well. It hadn't seemed to make any difference. The Yeerk in Jake's brother had said that Jake hadn't shown any reaction to the threat of killing his parents and what was the point of a hostage if it could not control someone's behavior?

Esplin had almost killed the two humans then for surely only one controlled family member was necessary to see if a weakness in Jake could be exploited but he had unexpectedly stayed his hand when he remembered how many of the involuntary hosts regarded death to be infinitely preferable to infestation. No doubt Jake was the same and even if his stolen family could not control him they could at least make him suffer.

Having that human be the one to take his ship and kill the bulk of the invasion with the Andalites mere hours away? It had been intolerable. All Esplin could do was blame the Yeerk traitors but that was a thin excuse at best.

Esplin had looked at the situation, realized that it was hopeless, and come to a decision. There was no escape. Even if he could escape the humans and Andalites both, he would need to return to his own people and they had always been far more creative than anyone else about punishing failure. It would be better to just be taken by the Andalites though, after everything, that would be humiliating and painful as well. No, the best option was truly to be killed by the humans.

Alloran had watched in a state of dazed awe. Elfangor had always been the only one (outside of arguably the former Visser One who had nominally been on the same side as him) to ever give Esplin any real trouble and then he had died in a way that Alloran still couldn't bring himself to think about when Esplin didn't make him. Once Elfangor was dead anything that might have once pretended to be hope was dead, too.

And then there were those Andalites who had been starting off slow but then gave Esplin setback after setback. They had morphed into Elfangor's humans and Esplin and those around him had seemed to forget the humans' very impressive record and dismissed the threat. Then the invasion had been exposed even if not everyone was willing to accept this very basic fact. Then the Yeerk Pool had been blown up. Esplin had been forced to make the Pool ship vulnerable and bring it down to Earth to try and salvage some of the invasion lest literally all of the troops on the ground die in less than seventy-two Earth hours.

It had looked like Esplin's unfortunate security chief had finally brought one of the "Animorphs" to heel. It wasn't the brother leader but perhaps he had succeeded because his host was familiar to them. The one called Cassie had been viewed as the weak link among them. She had been killed and maybe the others if they had been with her and Esplin had rejoiced.

But then they had been on the Pool ship as well. And Esplin had been infuriated by their tenacity and audacity but he had known that he was capable of tearing them apart. He just needed the right morph and Alloran's body could become so many monstrous things. It was his body only in that he could not be separated from it but it was all he had.

_{That hypocrite!} Esplin raged. {That filthy human __**hypocrite**__! He's not going to kill me. After all of this. He just blows things up and flushes them into space with no regard for lives then but now he's had enough of killing.}_

_Alloran said nothing. The humans might not want to kill them but they would soon enough. They wouldn't have a choice. It was a little confusing how they could justify all those deaths but not this one. Even Elfangor's long-ago excuse that the Yeerks were helpless didn't apply here. Esplin was _never _helpless. _

_{It's because of the brother and that girl, isn't it? He had to watch them die and now he doesn't have the resolve to do what must be done. This sort of cowardice is appalling. He didn't beat me. He didn't. It was those traitors.}_

_Alloran couldn't remember the last time Esplin had been this angry that he didn't morph into something from a planet no one had ever heard of and start killing. To do so here would be suicide. But wasn't that what he was looking for? _

_{I'm looking for _death_,} Esplin had told him, his tone dripping with disdain. {I'm not so weak as to try to kill myself. I'm not __**you**__.}_

And then he was on the floor. They must have knocked him out in case he tried to morph. It was unnecessary. He knew he could not win.

As he lay there, a suspicion started to dawn on him. He had been knocked out and just left there. If they were so worried about Esplin why would they do that. What purpose did knocking him out serve?

Could it be…could he…

It was impossible. He knew that. He knew that from the moment Elfangor had left him behind.

And yet Esplin was being strangely quiet and so unlike himself. Tentatively, Alloran attempted to blink.

He did.

But that could mean anything. It could be a coincidence. It could be some fresh torment of Esplin's, to make him believe in the impossible and then to send reality crashing down on him. He could pretend to be gone and do what Alloran was trying to do and then reveal himself. It would be something new but Esplin had just lost everything else except the power to make Alloran suffer.

Unless he had lost that, too.

He closed one stalk eye and then closed the other. He opened both of them. He made a fist.

What was he to do? Was Esplin really gone? Had he really lost Esplin without even being aware of it?

That wasn't bad. That was not bad at all. But it would feel…strange and anticlimactic after all the years to have lost him so unexpectedly. There wasn't anything in particular he would have wanted to say that he hadn't already said long ago but it would have been nice to have been aware of it happening. He could only imagine what sort of parting shot Esplin would have left with. Probably something about how worthless he was to be saved by humans or how no one would ever respect him again. They would always just look at him and see Visser One. It was probably true.

But if Esplin were really gone then it didn't matter.

If Esplin were really gone then who cares how they did it? He would have gladly had them cut his head open and yank the Yeerk out.

He couldn't believe it. Things like that just didn't happen. But then, humans didn't take Yeerk Pool ships, either.

Perhaps he was dead and this was some sort of afterlife. He had long-since accepted that death was the only freedom he was ever going to have and that even if all the theories were wrong and death was nothing but an absence of existence it would still be better than the life he had known. Yes, oblivion was preferable.

But if he was dead then why would he be lying on the same spot he remembered standing not long ago? If it was an afterlife he supposed that knowledge would come in time but in the meantime he might as well act as though he were still alive.

There was something happening around him and with difficulty he focused on it. He wasn't in the habit of being able to focus his own attention on anything outside of his head.

"This genius thinks we're Controllers trying to set him up," one of the humans said. He knew what they looked like by now but could not tell them apart by their voices.

"Perfect," another one said. "How do we get around this?"

Oh, that was easy. No matter how suspicious they were, and they had a right to be very suspicious of this, if they were surrendered to and offered a prize such as the Pool ship then they would have to take it seriously. Maybe it would not be enough to get them to believe them but at the very least they would be able to speak to whoever was in charge. They would have a chance.

The _Aristh _didn't appear to think of it, however, and the humans had no reason to know that. And here he was, knowing the answer, and quite unable to tell them.

It took him another moment to realize that maybe that wasn't true.

{Tell him you'll surrender the Pool ship to them.}

It _was_ true. The Yeerk was gone.

Was that his voice? Did it sound too much like Esplin? He wasn't shouting, at least.

The humans and Aximili turned to him, startled. They had all clearly forgotten about him. At least they had had the sense to free him first.

He climbed to his hooves, stunned.

The Andalite officer on the screen wasn't impressed. Alloran did not recognize him but then it would be surprising if he did. It had been a long time since he had gotten the chance to meet any Andalite himself and not whoever Esplin happened to take an interest in during the course of a battle. {So the deception is over. I see the Visser has revealed himself.}

'The Visser'?

It wasn't that he didn't understand the confusion. He did not know just how long it was since Esplin had been forced to leave but it couldn't have been that long if they were only calling the Andalites now. His people. Not the enemy.

But still, it burned to be so casually dismissed like that. He had had countless years of being completely ignored as his body was used to play out Esplin's twisted desires but no more. Now this was him and they may hate him but at least they would acknowledge that he was there.

Alloran did not know much about humans but these were children. He had been gone for so long that they may not have even been born when he was taken. There was no way that he would believe that Aximili had been alive at the time.

He started to correct the false impression though he was sure it would not convince them as there was nothing stopping Esplin from pretending to be him. He had used that to distract Arbat once. What had even happened to him? He clearly wasn't still here. Had he died? Returned home? Would he ever find out?

He didn't finish his protestation, however, in favor of turning his face towards the Animorphs leader Jake. He owed this human child more than he could ever say. Jake had lost much and could still lose more while he had just regained everything. The least he could afford him was his respect. {With your permission?}

It took Jake a moment to respond. Then he nodded and, though he did not know much about human tones, he presumed it was probably respectful as Jake said, "Please continue, War-Prince Alloran."

War-Prince Alloran. He had once been a war-prince, as he had told young Aximili back when he could barely even remember his own name. That had been a long time ago. He couldn't imagine that he would ever be given even the marginal responsibilities he had had after the Hork-Bajir home world. But he didn't think that they would have acknowledged what had happened for long enough to demote him so he probably still was one in name.

This human didn't have to call him that. It would have been enough to be addressed as Alloran. And yet he did. He had just lost a brother and a comrade and he still thought to do that. These humans really were special, weren't they?

He wanted to thank Jake but he didn't have the words nor the time to figure it out. Perhaps later. Or perhaps he could find a way to help, as foreign as the concept was. Action was always more valuable to warrior than pretty words.

{Who are you?} he asked the Andalite who still thought he was speaking to Visser One.

{I am Offeran-Jibril-Castant. I am officer of the day aboard the Andalite Dome ship…} Offeran paused and smiled almost self-mockingly. What a wonder to ask a question and get an answer! To be able to speak and be heard and be responded to! He wondered vaguely how many more seemingly simple things were going to astound him before he was used to this new freedom.{The Dome ship _Elfangor_.}

Elfangor hadn't even been dead that long but the impact he had on the galaxy could not be denied. He played a role in creating 'the abomination' though most didn't know that. He kept the Yeerks running scared for years. And he made this day possible. In the wake of all of that, how could he possibly stay angry? How could he have after Esplin had ripped him apart? It was fitting that it would be a ship named for him that had come to liberate this planet.

Well, perhaps that was not their intention but it would be what would happen if these Animorphs had any say in it and he had learned not to underestimate them. They couldn't come so far just to fail now.

{A Dome ship named for Elfangor,} Aximili said, looking almost dizzy from pride. {There is no higher honor for a warrior.}

{A well-named ship,} Alloran said. He wondered what they were thinking sending it to destroy Elfangor's precious Earth. Maybe they didn't know about Elfangor's human son and the woman he had had him with but if Elfangor was anything like he remembered (not that he had known him that well or for that long) then he wouldn't have let them remain ignorant of his attachment. Not when the Yeerks had their sights set on his favorite planet. {Now, officer-of-the-day Offeran, you're going to want to want to contact the captain because you have just captured a Yeerk Pool ship. We will advance at space normal speed to any point you name. All Bug fighters will be deployed around the ship, and as we reach the rendezvous point you will see all Bug fighters self-destruct. At that time we will detach the Pool ship's main engines. All weapons will be powered down. This ship will be perfectly helpless.}

They weren't quite orders but they were close enough that it felt very strange to be giving them. It was as if he had a say in what was going to happen. No one else there could play this part. The humans and Aximili would not know how and the Controllers still on the bridge wouldn't be interested. Nor would the Andalites be willing to take the word of a Controller. It was true that they still thought he was a Controller but he was not and they would come to see that in time.

Offeran paled, stunned, and quickly patched them through to his superior. Him Alloran recognized. He had known him personally before all of this happened though they had never been close. From what he remembered, Asculan was quite dedicated to stopping the Yeerks. After all this time and the new injuries he had (though new really could have been any time since his infestation), that determination had probably only increased. The Electorate wouldn't send just anybody to do what Asculan had likely been charged with doing.

"Big time?" Marco whispered.

There was no answer that he could hear but Aximili must have been explaining the situation.

Asculan stared straight at them, his fierce gaze lingering the longest on Alloran. He was not about to entertain any notions that the situation had changed and that could only end badly. But what could he say that would convince them? {Visser, I refuse to-}

"Hey, Ax-man," Marco interrupted suddenly. His face was doing something that he had not often seen which could only mean that he looked happy. "Is it true the Andalite home world is watching all this? Can I wave to them? Hi, everyone! Howard Stern rules! Yeah!"

Alloran understood very little of that. What was a Howard Stern?

But one thing he did realize was that Aximili must have broadcasted this message to the civilians. It made perfect sense tactically. The Blade ship was gone and the Pool ship, even before it had been disabled, was no match for it. There was nothing they could physically do to stop the Andalites from doing whatever they wanted and everybody knew it.

But unless the people had changed more than expected, Alloran could not see that they would react well to Earth being subjected to the same sort of treatment as the Hork-Bajir had been. Most people had not even really known what it was he was disgraced for but they had reacted violently to the idea that a quantum virus had been unleashed. There was no way the Electorate would want to deal with the backlash destroying the humans now would provide.

But that could only work as a preventative measure as long as the Andalites knew. If Asculan had taken the tough stance it looked like he was going to and denounced them all as Controllers then he would be hard-pressed to step down from that position even considering the consequences.

Marco had just insured that Asculan would have no choice but to speak with them.

Jake went very still and Aximili looked horrified. Evidently they hadn't realized just how Marco had saved the situation. If his actions weren't necessary he would have made them all look terribly foolish and weakened their position.

Alloran realized what the fact that the civilians were watching this meant, more than just forcing Asculan to talk with them. Everyone was watching; they had to be. This was not a common occurrence and it would be unendingly fascinating to his people. Those that had not happened to be watching at the time would quickly find a way to see what was unfolding.

Jahar and the children. They wouldn't be children anymore. He had watched Elfangor turn from barely more than a child himself into a mature adult, hadn't he? And he had certainly aged. His brother, if he still lived. Everyone else he had ever known.

But mostly Jahar and their beautiful children.

They would be seeing this. It was the first time they would have seen him since some months before his infestation. Yes, right now they might believe they were just looking at Visser One but they would see.

He was going home. He would see them all again. He was returning and would never ever leave them ever again.

Esplin, whatever his fate, had no more power over him.

He was almost overwhelmed by the knowledge but nobody was saying anything and Marco couldn't possibly explain what he had just said. It would make it obvious that he was threatening them.

{I should have mentioned that under orders from his prince, _Aristh _Aximili has patched this communication through to the civilian net.}


End file.
